Dorie Panganiban Page 2

By Dorie Panganiban – Farmington, New Mexico . . . Through donations by an online community, La Vida Mission continues to bless the Navajo community with much-needed propane gas used for basic cooking.

COVID-19 is severely impacting the Navajo Nation and its surrounding community.  While other communities were able to ease restrictions, the Navajo community in Farmington recently reintroduced their week-end lockdowns.  La Vida continues to bless this community in need through the ongoing, seemingly never-ending, pandemic.

In April, generous donors made it possible to give food baskets to the community on three different occasions.  On one occasion, the mission delivered food to individual homes, and the last two food distributions were staged out of the church parking lot.  Since April, La Vida has helped 375 families with much-needed food and bottled water.

After talking with families in the community, La Vida discovered that one of the greatest needs was propane gas for cooking. Knowing this was a major cost, La Vida wondered how they could afford to help them obtain propane gas. La Vida members took this urgent need to God in prayer.

Claire James, La Vida’s schoolteacher thought about doing a Facebook fundraiser to obtain the funds. She created the fundraiser and shared it with her Facebook friends who answered the need by donating enough to provide the propane gas.

It was a bit of a challenge finding a gas company who could do propane servicing to the mission, but praise God for Nations Gas, a Navajo-Pueblo-owned gas company, who happily agreed to partner with us and deliver the propane.

On Monday, June 29, this latest COVID-19 relief operation took place in the church parking lot. As many as 110 families were provided with free propane bottles to refill (100-lb, 40-lb, 30-lb and two 20-lb bottles per family) along with food, water, bags of flour, and instant noodles.

This has been an opportunity to make friends with everyone who made this possible as we served together and prayed with our new Native friends before the operation began.

-– Dorie Panganiban is community outreach director, La Vida Mission; photo supplied

By Dorie Panganiban — Farmington, New Mexico … Beautiful things are happening at La Vida Mission amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. While our daily services and various ministries and work duties continue and Sabbath worship for our missionaries takes place outdoors every week at our Tree House Park, God has enabled us to reach out to our native brothers and sisters through our Food Distributions and Free Propane Disbursement. Connections through Facebook, texts and phone calls, Bible studies, and corporate prayer in members’ homes have continued and through the Holy Spirit’s working, hearts have been changed and decisions made to surrender lives and follow the Lord all the way.

On Sabbath, June 27, two Navajo young men, Brothers Zachariah and Xavier George, sealed their decisions to give their hearts to God and become members of the church through baptism. This was officiated by Pastor Steve Gillham, director of the La Vida Mission. Because the Tribe’s Health order does not yet allow us to meet in the church, their baptisms were conducted in a tank by the dried pond at our Tree House Park.

Both of these young people have been coming to our church for quite some time with their youngest brother, Yngwie, and their parents, Jason and Bertha, who were baptized several years ago during our Native Camp Meeting in 2016.  Both boys gave testimonies, telling how their parents’ baptism and their membership in the Church have made a huge change in their family where drugs and alcohol, physical and verbal abuse are part of the norm. They expressed their gratitude for the love and warm acceptance that their family received from the members of the La Vida Mission Church, which to them serves as an inspiration, encouragement and a guiding light shining in their paths. Please join us in prayer as we continue to minister to this special group of God’s people, our Navajo Native Community.

–Dorie Panganiban is community outreach director, La Vida Mission; photos supplied